Their Poems
by Eyes of Sapphire
Summary: Drabble series about John and Sherlock's relationship through poems that they give to each other. JOHNLOCK.


**Author's Note: This will be a series of poem related drabbles. Each poem will feature a different stage of John and Sherlock's relationship. **

**Disclaimer: The characters are not mine, they belong to BBC. The poems are not mine, they belong to their poets. **

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It actually wasn't that unusual for criminals to include art in their crime. Especially poetry. Criminals loved poetry, Sherlock had found. After one particular case where the criminal had written a verse of a poem on the wall and the rest of the poem explained who had done it and why, Sherlock had started reading poetry. Because it was far easier for him to have several hundred poems catalogued in his Mind Palace than to have to physically find the poem. It did appeal to him on some level, the mathematics and rhythm behind it was very musical and he ended up memorizing many poems with songs. And after much research in an area, one always forms a preference, Sherlock was no different. While Shakespeare was an oft cited poet (Sherlock had several theories as to why), Sherlock most enjoyed Emily Dickinson.

Yes, Emily Dickinson. Someone who probably led on of the most dull lives on earth, was Sherlock's favorite poet. It was equal parts her complete knowledge and command of the English language and her fascination with death that attracted Sherlock. He knew that her poems were not commonly used (he thought that most people were too stupid to be able to appreciate her) so he admitted, only to himself, that he read her poems for pleasure.

He and Miss Dickinson had such different lives, Sherlock wondered why then it was so easy to relate to her. She was most likely agoraphobic, he loved to leave the flat. She was clearly emotional, Sherlock was anything but. But they were united over their love for morbidity.

And there was again something that he would never admit. Through Emily Dickinson's poems, Sherlock began to feel; not his own emotions, but hers. He began to understand what loss felt like, what love felt like, and worst, what heartbreak felt like. That was the most painful emotion he decided.

For a very long time Sherlock was able to keep Dickinson's emotions away from his own. He would not let her make him feel anything relative to his own life. And then he met John.

To Sherlock everything about John was poetic: his bravery, his loyalty, and his compassion. John made Sherlock want to write his own poems. Sherlock once acted on this notion later deciding that it was better to just find poems representing how he felt.

Nothing seemed to match his feelings accurately though. Except for the love poems.

Could Sherlock really love John?

Yes, he could, Sherlock decided.

He kept this to himself though, John was straight and even if he wasn't Sherlock was sure that John would never consider him as a suitable boyfriend.

But Miss Dickinson said it best for him, if not a bit overdramatically.

_I cannot live with You –_

_It would be Life –_

_And Life is over there – Behind the Shelf -_

_The Sexton keeps the Key to_

_Putting up_

_Our Life – His Porcelain –_

_Like a Cup –_

_Discarded of the Housewife –_

_Quaint – or Broke –_

_A newer Sevres pleases –_

_Old Ones crack –_

_I could not die – with You –_

_For One must wait_

_To shut the Other's Gaze down –_

_You – could not –_

_And I – could I stand by_

_And see You – freeze –_

_Without my Right of Frost –_

_Death's privilege?_

_Nor could I rise – with You –_

_Because Your Face_

_Would put out Jesus' –_

_That New Grace_

_Grow plain – and foreign_

_On my homesick Eye –_

_Except that You than He_

_Shone closer by –_

_They'd judge Us – How –_

_For You – served Heaven –_

_You know,_

_Or sought to –_

_I could not –_

_Because You saturated Sight –_

_And I had no more Eyes_

_For sordid excellence_

_As Paradise_

_And were You lost, I would be –_

_Though My Name_

_Rang loudest_

_On the Heavenly fame –_

_And were You – saved –_

_And I – condemned to be_

_Where You were not –_

_That self – were Hell to Me –_

_So We must meet apart –_

_You there – I – here –_

_With just the Door ajar_

_That Oceans are – and Prayer –_

_And that White Sustenance –_

_Despair –_

Of course it would be she that captured everything that Sherlock felt. And of course that would be the poem that John one day caught Sherlock whispering to himself.

"What was that?" John asked.

"What?" Sherlock asked back, unaware of what he had been doing.

"You just said 'Because your face would put out Jesus' that new grace,'" John repeated word for word.

Sherlock might have blushed. "It's just a poem that I know," Sherlock explained feigning nonchalance.

John could tell that Sherlock wasn't in the sharing mood so he dropped it, keeping the bit of information for questions on a different day.

But another day did not come. A few months later Sherlock fell and John could never ask the detective why he had such a sad poem in his Mind Palace.

It wasn't until after Sherlock had died that John had fully investigated his room. He found many notebooks, some several years old, containing scribbles about experiments or cases or theories. And he found poetry books. They surprised him most. Thick volumes of Shakespeare, Frost, Plath, Hughes, Cummings, and Dickinson all with little notes and annotations written in the margins. Some were typical Sherlock like at the top of Sonnet 141 a darkly penned _strong motivation to kill_. And some just didn't seem like Sherlock, the note of _How cases make me feel_ above Dickinson's "I Felt a Funeral, in my Brain." And one was the most shocking. John recognized part of the poem as the one he had heard Sherlock reciting but the note was what mattered, _How I Love John_ it said.

Sherlock had loved him? And this tragic poem was the one he thought best represented that? John could think of hundreds of happier, more optimistic poems. Ones that took into account how he felt.

How he felt. How did he feel? He certainly didn't ignore Sherlock, or think he was better than Sherlock. In fact, he knew that Sherlock was better than him. If anything this poem applied more to how John felt about Sherlock. John wanted Sherlock so much, wanted to be with him so much, but he doubted that he would ever deserve Sherlock.

Paging through Sherlock's books he began to mark poems, describing how he felt, at first it was "I Do Not Love Thee," but then he thought, and read more and more. He finally decided on how he felt in E. E. Cummings' poem "i carry your heart with me (i carry it in."

_i carry your heart with me(i carry it in_

_my heart)i am never without it(anywhere_

_i go you go,my dear;and whatever is done_

_by only me is your doing,my darling)_

_i fear_

_no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want_

_no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)_

_and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant_

_and whatever a sun will always sing is you_

_here is the deepest secret nobody knows_

_(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud_

_and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows_

_higher than soul can hope or mind can hide)_

_and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart_

_i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)_

This was how John felt. He gently dog eared the page and noted his thoughts on the top of the page.

He read all of Sherlock's books, adding his own thoughts to the pages in blue ink so he knew them from Sherlock's. He compared their notes, realizing for the first time how emotionally in tune Sherlock could be.

When Sherlock returned John didn't really think about all of the notes he'd written in Sherlock's books. He didn't think about anything but how good it was to have Sherlock back.

Until Sherlock brought it up one day. "John, did you write in my books?"

"I'm so sorry Sherlock! I thought you were gone! I didn't know... I'm sorry..." John apologized quickly.

"It's fine John... your notes are interesting, I'm enjoying reading them," He said with a small smile, retreating to his room again.

John knew instantly that he'd have to get rid of his note on the Cummings poem. Once Sherlock was out, doing something with the Scotland Yard, John snuck into his room, quickly finding the right book. He flipped through the pages and stopped on the poem seeing a note written beneath his. _I feel the same way_.

That night Sherlock got home, John had a poem ready.

"_Of all the souls that stand create_

_I have elected one._

_When sense from spirit files away,_

_And subterfuge is done;_

_When that which is and that which was_

_Apart, intrinsic, stand,_

_And this brief tragedy of flesh_

_Is shifted like a sand;_

_When figures show their royal front_

_And mists are carved sway,—_

_Behold the atom I preferred_

_To all the lists of clay!_"

He recited as Sherlock walked into the Drawing Room.

"Dammit John! That's the one I was going to use!" Sherlock smiled as he walked up to John.

John grinned back. "There are plenty of other poems Sherlock, I'm sure you can think of one."

"Ah! I have one!" He smiled.

"_Mine - by the Right of the White Election!_

_Mine - by the Royal Seal!_

_Mine - by the sign in the Scarlet prison -_

_Bars - cannot conceal!_

_Mine - here - in Vision - and in Veto!_

_Mine - by the Grave's Repeal -_

_Titled - Confirmed -_

_Delirious Charter!_

_Mine - long as Ages steal!_"

"That I am, Sherlock." John replied in a whisper before kissing Sherlock gently.

-/-/-/-/-

**Author's Note: First a note on the Emily Dickinson poems. When Dickinson died none of her poems had been published. This meant that she had no control of what happened when they were published. So the publishers changed a lot. Sometimes it was just punctuation and other times it was the words. For "I cannot live with you" I published the original version because I have a book that is all originals. The other Dickinson ones, the ones that John and Sherlock recite to each other are just the ones that I don't know if they were edited.**


End file.
